


True Love's Course

by Lempo Soi (Lemposoi)



Category: Were the World Mine (2008)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Canon Relationship, Coming Out, F/M, M/M, Male Protagonist, POV Male Character, POV Third Person, Past Tense, Wordcount: 1.000-3.000, Wordcount: 1.000-5.000
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-05-22
Updated: 2010-05-22
Packaged: 2017-10-09 15:43:13
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,673
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/88989
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lemposoi/pseuds/Lempo%20Soi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jonathon's side of the story: Nine moments we never saw, and five we did.</p>
            </blockquote>





	True Love's Course

**Author's Note:**

> Written before "Run Smooth" and mostly in order to get inside Jonathon's head.

PART I

Jonathon watched Timothy walk away down the hall. He always seemed to be watching the back of Timothy's head. Whenever Jonathon looked his way, Timothy looked away. Whenever he approached, Timothy skitted away. Even so, he was sure he'd sometimes caught Timothy looking at him.

Yeah. He was in trouble.

*

Becky's lips were oily and tasted sharply of apple lip gloss. Jonathon found himself distracted.

She stopped kissing him – did she notice? - to pull a piece of gum out of her mouth. "Hey, you're coming to the county fair, right?" she asked for the third time that evening.

"Sure," said Jonathon and ruffled her hair.

"You bastard, you're gonna skip it!"

She was trying to sound angry, but Jonathon wasn't buying it. He kissed her again and forgot about the lip gloss. Her mouth was sweet enough without it.

*

Jonathon had gone through a Serious Talk after that one time his parents had found Becky's bra under his bed. His mother told him "all these feelings" were just because he was young, that they would pass, and in the end he'd be happier if he kept it in his pants. Jonathon's father, confidentially, told him that, no, it wouldn't - you just got better at controlling it.

Jonathon wasn't sure he believed either of them. He knew his duty, though, and what was best for himself and for Becky, and he kept to it. She'd never have to worry about broken condoms or birth control pills. You couldn't get pregnant from heavy petting, could you?

Irma, back in junior year, she'd known all about condoms and pills and had shown Jonathon a thing or two, too. He'd never been caught with her, though.

It was "just" sex, sure. Even when his cock was so hard it was hurting, skin stretched tight over the swollen thing (bad circumcision, God fucking dammit) – even when he wanted to melt together with someone, anyone, even Becky, who cared more about what he did than what he wanted, sweet-smelling Becky, when his visions at night made him physically ill with want – it was just sex.

It still was not worth giving up what was really important.

He had his position in the rugby team, his future. His grades weren't bad, but they were not the kind of guarantee a sports scholarship would be. Besides, he wanted this. He wanted to go pro. Was that so crazy? Wasn't it crazier to choose to--

*

Jonathon fell asleep every night in his room listening to the sound of wind in the hollowed-out tree outside his window, dreaming of the field, of rolling in the mud and hearing the crowd's roar like an ocean in the background.

*

Breakfast was, like always, rice porridge with a swirl of strawberry jam on top. Jonathon's mother had learned to make it like this from her mother, who learned it from her mother, whose grandparents had brought the style over from Denmark somewhere around the turn of the century. "It'll make you big and strong," she always said. So far, it seemed to be working. All of Jonathon's family was strongly built, and those in the family who also tended towards athletics carried it well. His mother would be heading out to the track first thing after Jonathon was out the door.

She stood by the sink with her back turned to him, singing a sea ditty, of all things, as she washed out the porridge pot. Her middle had begun to spread, he noticed - firm, but wide, as if her body were deciding it was done conforming to a youthful ideal.

"Mom?" Jonathon asked, and swallowed, coughed, and took a sip of milk in preparation.

"You're gay," she said without turning around. Jonathon nearly choked on his milk.

"No!"

"No?" She turned, and the look in her eyes was strange, as if she were deciding whether or not to be angry, or what to be angry about.

"No, Mom." Jonathon's heart was beating fast, and he was sure that he was blushing. But he was not lying. Not exactly. "I just meant to tell you that--"

What? About how the rugby team kept picking on the one queer kid in school, how trapped Jonathon felt between his teammates, whom he shared a goddamn _brotherhood_ with, and the kid who was maybe a little bit like him? Timothy, with his elven face and his intense eyes always flickering away from Jonathon--

"Just that the school play's coming along well," Jonathon mumbled. "We're almost into dress rehearsals. I'm kind of starting to like it. Which doesn't mean I'm gay," he added, rolling his eyes at his mother's smirk. "Jesus."

"Don't you take his name in vain," she said sharply, turning back to the dishes. "That's one of the better commandments."

Jonathon wondered what her criteria was.

"Here's Becky for you," she said as the doorbell rang.

*

Jonathon always walked half the way to school with Becky, who lived two houses down the street, unless she had practice or a late class that week. They'd been doing that since they were fourteen, but as a couple, only for about six months. The only difference was that now they walked, her small hand was in his, or their arms wrapped around each other, her thin one around his middle, his around her shoulders, like couples did.

Becky informed him that six months was her record time for being "in a relationship." Jonathon had to admit it was his, too. It was kind of funny, but he'd somehow thought he'd get to know her better by now. Irma had been instantaneous, fun and violent, a lifelong friendship created in twenty-four hours and over in three weeks. After six months, Becky might still have been that fourteen-year-old girl walking across the street in the same direction as him, with her nose up in the air, daring him to stare.

"I wish I was in your play," she said, squeezing his hand. "What was the part you play again?"

"Lysander."

"A lover, right?" When she grinned at him like that, head cocked back, eyes sparkling, he always thought she must really like him. "I wish I played your girlfriend. What was her name?"

"Hermia."

"I should say his name." A look of distaste passed over her face, a curl marring its smoothness. "I think it's hideous. You should be allowed to have girls in the play. That bitch Tebbit is making you look queer."

Jonathon felt his heart drop to the bottom of his belly. His jaw tightened. "Becky."

"Wouldn't you rather have me in the play?" She gave him a coy look, but it fluttered and faded into surprise when she saw the the look on his face.

*

PART II

Timothy ran off the stage, towards Coach Driskill, and threw his hand forward. The coach cried out and stepped back. Timothy had sprayed water on him. Jonathon had no idea why. He wasn't sure he cared.

He was staring at the back of Timothy's head, the line of his neck, his ears jutting out, the roundness of his skull, and down, across the long, thin back and on to his pants stretched tight across his flesh, holy fuck.

When Timothy turned and shot him a grin, impish and delighted and thoroughly Timothy, it was all Jonathon could do not to tackle him to the ground and start nibbling on him.

_Timothy. Oh my god. Timothy._

It was like a dam had come crumbling down inside him, leaving him flooded with hot, white light. The air was full of song, and yet no one was singing. He could barely believe he had ever thought rugby was more important than this. His sweet prince. His lovely fairy. _Timothy._

*

"What was that all about?" Jonathon asked as he followed Timothy off of the rugby field. The others were doing a new routine, but Jonathon couldn't have cared less. He'd only gone back to get his coat and bag. That girl, Frankie, was still shouting on the track.

"Just a mistake," Timothy said with an embarrassed laugh.

"Was that guy your boyfriend?" Jonathon was surprised at the jab of jealous pain the thought evoked.

"No! No, we're just friends."

"Timothy."

They were already at the edge of the grove lining the rugby field. Jonathon grabbed Timothy by the shoulders and shoved his thin frame against a poplar trunk. He could feel the bones under his flesh, the heat of his skin through his shirt. Timothy was taller than him, but when he turned his face up and against Timothy's, Timothy folded down against him, chest to chest, and the two of them fit together perfectly.

Maybe it was too soon, too fast, but it didn't feel like soon enough.

*

Hatred burned cold in his belly. Timothy wanted him. Not this guy. Such a pretty face the boy had. He'd make it less pretty. Teach him. Goddamn, teach him to mess with true love.

*

Timothy came for him by the lake, guiding his bike by hand. His brow was twisted in a frown, but it dissolved when Jonathon touched his face, kissed his mouth.

"Is he okay?" Jonathon asked, meaning the beautiful boy. There was a whiplash of hatred still in his belly that wanted the answer to be 'no,' but he quelled it. "I don't know what came over me."

"He is nothing to me, okay?" Timothy said vehemently. "And yeah, you did hurt him. Don't do that, okay?"

"I thought he'd take you away from me," Jonathon said in anguish, his lips on Timothy's cheek, neck, collarbone.

"That's not going to happen." Timothy's breath hitched in his throat, and Jonathan's lips curled into a smile against his divine skin.

Jonathon felt mad, dizzy, crazy in love, like there was poetry crawling just beneath his skin. It was like falling free.

*

There was something sharp under his back, but he didn't care because Timothy was raining kisses on his neck. He was still wet from the swim and getting Timothy's shirt wet too, but that just made a good excuse to get that off as well.

Every touch felt like fucking starlight condensed, and if he'd thought he'd wanted sex before, he'd just been imagining a faint reflection of what lust could be. It wasn't about bums or titties or sand clinging to brown skin. What was it Shakespeare called it? The beast with two backs. One creature. Two made one. He wanted Timothy inside him and to be inside him, nestled deep and close until there was no telling where one started and the other ended.

Timothy was resisting, but Jonathon was peeling back that resistance, inch by inch, crawling closer to his goal.

"No!" Timothy gasped and pushed himself off the ground and off Jonathon. "I can't."

"Yes, you can," said Jonathon in a raspy whisper and reached up for him.

"No." Timothy sat up and away from him, breathing hard. The bright morning light was filtering through the leaves above. It had barely felt like an hour, rather than all night.

"Timothy, please."

"Trust me," said Timothy with a dark laugh. "You don't want this. Not really."

"You know, I kind of think I do." It hit him then. "But _you_ don't."

"I can't," Timothy said, shaking his head. "Not like this. It'd be-- I'll explain later." Timothy grabbed a tuft of grass and pulled it off the ground, then threw it away. It was a strange, angry gesture that didn't seem to fit in with the scene. Jonathon lay back on the grass, catching his breath and staring up at the flecks of bright sunlight until the pain in his eyes almost overlaid the pain of need in his crotch.

"Okay. Okay," he said, letting out a long puff of air. "Just give me a minute."

"Sorry," said Timothy, still not looking at him, instead curling up with his knees under his chin.

"I may need to go for another cold swim."

Timothy chuckled, and there was some of the abandon that Jonathon felt in that sound, in the breathy, incredulous tremble of it.

*

After another swim, it did seem easier to just hold Timothy as he lay in Jonathon's lap in the speckled sunlight, talking about his theory of music, of all things. Jonathon knew his scales and that was about it, but the way Timothy talked about it, music was a thing of magic.

So, not knowing what to add and so as not to be silent, he told Timothy about the porridge and the family story that said the Laursen's had come over on an ocean liner that sailed through the first stages of what would become the 1900 Galveston Hurricane. As his great-great grandmother had been born that day, the family said it was a life created where deaths would begin. That's why the family moved inland – their former shipmates were beginning to call them Norse witches.

Timothy told him about his mother and nothing at all of his father, so Jonathon bit his tongue over talking about his father's mixed ancestry, of his way with animals, or the way he and his mother had a monthly fight about the different moustaches he insisted on trying out. He spoke instead of how he could never have a little brother or sister, not after the accident that happened when he was five...

*

Jonathon looked up at Timothy, blinking water out of his eyes, and found that the stars were gone. The tingle in his skin from where Timothy's body was closest to him had blinked out, just like that.

It was still Timothy looking down on him, as beautiful – in his way – as he'd always been, but Jonathon – he felt – nothing.

He breathed, confused, in and out, and Timothy said, "Goodbye."

*

PART III

Jonathon escaped into the backdrop as the band came on. He found a pile of rough paper towels in the small toilet stall at the back and wiped his face.

The band sounded louder than he remembered from the dress rehearsal.

Jonathon stood for a moment by the sink, gripping its side, still catching his breath, his mind turning in circles around Timothy.

He felt sorry for Becky for the first time since he and Timothy got together. What had he been thinking? He'd have to talk to her. He'd acted like an ass.

But how do you apologize for something you're so glad happened?

With that thought, he found his serenity had returned, and as the last few chords of the song died out, he sneaked back to the stage. From the sidelines, he watched Timothy perform the epilogue.

No, Timothy was not made of starlight or roses. Jonathon saw him as he was and thought he was wonderful.

*

Timothy had never recoiled from his kiss before. Jonathon wondered why he weren't more surprised. Timothy was keeping his distance, keeping his secrets.

Jonathon's father had once rescued a cat from a sewer pipe, and what a ragged and sorry thing it had been, full of rage and fear. The vet had had to sedate it just to let them wash and dress its wounds. They nailed up notices for the owner, but no one came forward. It had hid under furniture and only came out to eat when everyone was asleep. The general consensus had been that the cat was wild beyond taming, but Dad had named her Cassie, talked to her, waited her out. He was convinced she'd come around, and sure enough, little by little, she did.

Jonathon was perfectly willing to wait Timothy out.

"It's not enough to speak, but to speak true." Timothy's eyes swivelled to Ms. Tebbit, then back to Jonathon again, going from worry to a slow amazement.

It was a light kiss Timothy gave him then, still unsure. And there, then, the tingle returned, like a shiver of magic.

It was far from their first kiss, but somehow to Jonathon, it felt like one - like the beginning of something new. He was looking forward to it.


End file.
